On the night between 16 and 17 January in many towns in Sardinia, Saint Anthony the Abbot is celebrated. The symbol of the celebration is the fire that burns piles of wood, around which the community gathers to ask the Saint for grace and miracles.

The rite of fire of Saint Anthony, between Christian devotion and ancient pagan traditions, has been documented since the mid-19th century, even if its origins go back to more remote times. According to legend, Saint Anthony, an exponent of Egyptian asceticism in the 3rd century AD, went to hell with his ferula rod and piglet, managing to steal a spark of fire to bring as a gift to humanity, which until then had been forced to survive the cold, in the dark, prey to the onslaught of wild beasts.

The lighting of ritual bonfires on the occasion of the above-mentioned festive emergency, in addition to being linked to the legend of the gift by the Fire Saint - an indispensable tool for numerous cultural techniques, such as cooking food - is linked to deeper meanings. For a form of sympathetic magic (by virtue of which the like attracts the like), the lighting of the fire intends to restore strength to the sun, so as to promote the passage of season, the spring awakening of nature and above all the growth of cultivated plants.

There are many places on the island where bonfires are set up in honor of the saint. There are also cases, such as in Quartu Sant'Elena, where this ritual, abandoned some time ago, has been brought back into vogue, in line with the modern dynamics of “rediscovering tradition”.

The rite of lighting the fire begins the previous days with the choice, collection and transport of shrubs to burn, usually bundles or hollow plants inside. The entire community participates in the collection and transport of wood. Bonfires, in the various towns of Sardinia, take on different names. The most generic and common term is fogadoni or fogadone. Other names derive from the type of wood used: sa tuva (which indicates the hollow oak wood inside, devoid of branches and roots), sas frascas (shrubs of the Mediterranean scrub, such as strawberry tree, mastic tree, cistus) and su romasinu (rosemary branches). The trunks are placed in a vertical position in the center of the square, often in front of the church dedicated to the Saint. In the holes of the cut branches, some bay leaves are inserted, which will be used to light the fire. Since the bay leaf, like rosemary, is an evergreen plant, the propitiatory function of its presence in the ritual bonfire underlies the hope of a fruitful repetition of the agrarian cycle, without interruptions caused by natural disasters. Once the preparation of the bonfire is finished, the priest blesses the logs and the fire. From that moment on, the party can begin, which continues all night until the fire is spontaneously extinguished. The drawings created by smoking provide omens and prophecies for the agrarian year.

In addition to the ceremonial fireworks, the celebrations of Saint Anthony in Sardinia, show, as a constant, the production of sweets offered to the saint with congratulatory functions or in order to implore a grace. Votive sweets are blessed in church and/or in contact with ceremonial fire, according to precise rituals punctuated by rigidly codified gestures and norms.

For example, in Bono, women with baskets containing sas cogones de pistiddu (sapa-based sweets) make sas inghiradas (the circles) around su fogarone (the ritual bonfire): tres a dresta and tres a manca ('three on the right and three on the left').

In some countries, the feast of Saint Anthony marks the beginning of Carnival. So in Mamoiada, where you can witness the dressing and the first public release of the traditional masks of the Mamuthones and the Issohadores (Essia knows first). In Ottana we celebrate s'Ogulone de Sant'Antoni and the first Messiah of Boes and Merdules. At Orotelli sos Thurpos they stage propitiatory rites.

Even in other places such as Bosa, Neoneli, Oniferi and Orani, the lighting of the fires represents the beginning of the Carnival season.

In many countries, for example Dorgali, the ritual fire is also lit three days later, in honor of Saint Sebastian, whose holiday falls on January 20. The simplest decoration of the votive dessert prepared for these days of celebration, on pistiddu (two sealed sheets containing a filling made with honey or sapa), consists of an engraving depicting a cross on the upper side of the cake and, in the four fields marked by the latter, the initials S.A. (Saint Anthony) and S.S. (Saint Sebastian). The most complex decorations, installed, in addition to Dorgali, in other Nuoro countries (e.g. Orani), have floral and plant motifs, aimed at propitiating the spring flourishing of nature.